Let us presume that one person or persons were to torture another person by joining their buttocks together in such a way that no excrement could be expelled. Perhaps it would be done by super-gluing, or some very adhesive caulking. Maybe just wrapping an elastic bandage around the body extremely tightly.
I presume that this would, in some way, lead to the death of the tortured individual. Perhaps it would cause some kind of toxic poisoning? A ruptured lower intestine (which I suppose might then lead to toxic poisoning?) What would be the most likely cause of death?
Um, well, a couple of years back I lost a coworker I was fond of in sort of a similar manner. He had been unable to shit for over a week, then got to the point where he couldn’t even fart, due to some sort of intestinal blockage.
I believe the actual cause of death when he finally keeled in the parking garage was heart failure. Not sure of the actual mechanisms involved, I imagine there was some sort of “domino effect”.
I had a medic that was telling us about dehydration, and how one of the more serious conditions was called fecal impaction literally, you’re full of sh*t.
He mentioned it could, with time, kill you. If you’re bowels were so blocked up enough that they started to go through necrosis, the resulting infection could spread through your body and kill you.
All this, just to remind us to drink our water. :eek:
Tripler
It became a pet term to describe what people thought of others, too.
Basically he was unable to eat after things started backing up. Vet’s x-rays showed a large mass within his large intestines that couldn’t be manually removed and would require massive surgery (removal of the intestines and reattachment).
But the damage from not eating enough (I had to hand feed him) took it’s toll on his liver and he had to be put to sleep soon after (liver failure).
And the story of Heather O’Rourke is true. She died in surgery trying to remove the obstruction.
Most likely a rupture or other damaging flaw in the rectum or descending colon would occur – but there might also be the possibility for some sort of infective growth to occur in the fecal mass, causing systemic poisoning of some sort.
However, the person would leave a substantial estate at his/her death from his/her successful career in talk radio!
According to Snopes, she’d been diagnosed with Crohn’s disease the year before her death, so this was not just a one-time bowel problem. Findadeath has some more specific information about her death, but I’m not sure how accurate their sources are.
I’ve seen this several times at the VA hospital where I work, what with its older patient population. A severe impaction can cause a bowel rupture leading to peritonitis then sepsis. It’s not a pleasant way to go.
I don’t think “confide” would be the proper word. He grumbled about his gut troubles to his coworkers for about a week before he finally died. We all begged him to go see a doctor, but he just refused to. The guy was fifty-two years old and ostensibly of sound mind. We couldn’t very well hog tie him and drag him to the Fremont Street Medical Center (although it was a tempting idea).
Basically, his death was suicide by natural causes.